Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Maui Day 4: Beaches, and yes, you can sunburn your hands.

Today was our "relax" day. Usually I hate relaxing but tried to be a good sport.

Spent it at Kamaole III Beach, though we walked to Kamaole II twice during since there were more aggressive waves for boogie boarding. This made for some awesome rides... and some equally epic wipeouts. Doug got a cut on his foot to match mine and a boatload of water stuck in his ears. I lost a hair tie once and my swim suit bottoms multiple times. I was able to recover the bottoms but sadly the hair tie is gone.

Got plate lunch at Da Kitchen. It was EXCELLENT - another great find from Betty.

I didn't even try the salad (because I'm not even going to pretend the health benefits of a salad will cancel out even a small portion of the meal we just shared). The Kahlua pork was excellent, but you had to eat it with the rice - too salty otherwise (which was just fine). Steamed pork wrapped in taro leaves was delicious. The chicken katsu was OK - a fried chicken with a thick breading, the sauce it came with (not pictured) was a little too much. Chicken w/ long rice was surprisingly very flavorful - it was seasoned well. The macaroni salad was gross but I'm not a big fan of macaroni salad (unlike corn). Teriaki chicken was perfect, and the steamed pork in taro leaves was excellent - the taro leaves were bitter (sort of like a chard or kale) but the delicious pork inside was amazing.

Eating a ton of food makes you want to eat more food, so shout-out to Susan for grabbing some ice cream during a beach break. She even wrote down the flavor profile (because it was pretty complex, and, she's traveling with a few Type A personalities and self proclaimed foodies).

Beach was beautiful and all had a great time - and everyone caught a few great waves at KII.

Tanya explaining to an elderly tourist how it's done on the boogie boards.

Doug and I even pulled off a tandem boogie board ride. We tried (and failed at) several techniques. The winning method was modeled after a "Wild Horses Can't Be Broken" movie - I played the blind girl, Doug played the horse. Unfortuantly,we have no photos, and I think I'm quoting the movie song and not the actual title, but picture Doug as a horse, the waves as a horse run/ring, and me as a blind girl trying to jump on a horse as it runs by, but on a wave, and you've got the scene.

Kamaole III also produced some good people watching.

For instance: I witnessed the most intense sun protection suit ever. No, this is not a wet suit. It is a full body sun protection mechanism...

... complete with a HOOD. That's right, a hood. Where do you even purchase a wardrobe staple/fashion statement like this?

The beach also included your standard irritating juggler-type stoners.

Rope ball thingys to the left, hoops to the right.

Action shot of the ball on a rope thing-y's. What are these? And why?

The presence of these people signaled it was time to get the hell out of Kamaole.

Off to Wailea Beach! Filled with private cabanas and wealthy people. We did not belong here. At all.

But here we were!

After about 3 minutes of sitting in the sun, I decided to move my blanket to an abandoned station with a rented umbrella. Yes. I stole shade.

It was only mildly awkward when the owners (renters?) of the chairs and umbrella made a return. I immediatly told them I'd been guarding their items, had fended off three theives, and no - they didn't have to pay me.

Meanwhile I left Doug out to the sun's rays. The popcorn he's chowing down on, while delicious, did nothing to protect his hands. Which got sunburned.

These hands are sunburned.

Yes, that is right, apparently you can sunburn your hands, and unfortunately a light dusting of cheddar popcorn does nothing to protect you from ultraviolet radiation. I know what you're thinking, and no, that full body sun protection suit would have done nothing to protect his hands. It was the only exposed area on the entire suit - a huge miss!

Doug and Tanya left to make dinner, which was kind, because it allowed the rest of the group to watch another beautiful sunset...

... and come back to the house with a totally awesome and much anticipated Taco Night!

Taco Night Chef du Jour, standing proud in front of his feast.

An example of a properly assembled taco. Complete with tots.

Action shot of the gang, enjoying taco night with extreme delight and concentration.

Taco Night was only slightly distressed by the fact that Doug had ocean water in his ear and was worreid about an ear infection. Nurse Tanya cooked up a medical solution (vinegar + rubbing alcohol + q-tip) for Medical Assistant Becky to funnel in to Doug's ear.

Medical treatment.

Administering medication.

Post-procedure, Doug's ear wasn't feeling much better. So we consulted the experts. Meaning, Tanya turned to WikiHow, which had a very helpful pictoral demonstration of how to remove water from your ears.

The stand-one-one-leg-tilt-your-head-and-hop-on-one-leg method.

The stand-one-one-leg-tilt-your-head-and-hop-on-one-leg method.

I'll keep you posted on how the ears are feeling tomorrow.

So what about you? Have any good pork lately? Do you juggle? Are you planning on quitting your juggling gig soon because it's kind of lame? Any good ear infection or sunburn healing tips and tricks? Do you prefer your tacos: with or without tots?

I felt pretty good about my boogie boarding day. My major accomplishments - getting thanked by Doug's new boogie boarding buddy for my wave recommendation, giving advice to an elderly woman about boogie boarding, multiple mid-wave high fives with Doug, my suggestion for the tandem riding, and, most importantly, my decision not to go into the waves at Kam II where Becky got repeatedly pummeled. Sadly, no photographs of that. As if that weren't enough, I also found the awesome web posting that convinced Doug to jump on one foot http://www.wikihow.com/Remove-Fluid-in-Ears.

You are like a boogie boarding expert. Awesome. And yes, I must give you credit for the tandem boogie suggestion. It was excellent. Your decision to avoid the waves at Kam II was also excellent. Now you see the necessity of bringing a cell phone camera on vacation - you never know when you're going to snap a great shot of something embarrassing!